The building features a ten-story clocktower on the southeast corner, facing the intersection of Pacific Avenue and S 7th Street.

Hugh Campbell Wallace of Tacoma, who would later become the United States ambassador to France, gave the bells and chimes in memory of his daughter on Christmas Day, 1904.

[2] The bells were removed during the 2023 restoration due to being a seismic hazard and conflicting with current building codes.

"[2] The building was designed by the San Francisco firm, Hatherton and Mclntosh.

1836 d. 1896) had established a private architecture practice in San Francisco in the 1870s, and was hired in 1877 as a draftsman and assistant to prominent architect August Laver in 1877.

[3][4] Laver, an English architect who moved San Francisco from Canada 1871 when he won a design competition for San Francisco's new City Hall, resigned soon thereafter due to health complications and problems with the City Hall construction project, and Hatherton assumed Laver's role on the project.

[5][6] Hatherton established his own practice with John Cotter Pelton in 1879, before assuming the position of City Architect of San Francisco in 1888.

On March 1, 1896, Hatherton was reported missing from his home in San Francisco.

Surge Tacoma has a budget of $15 million for the project, which will include 40 micro apartments, two restaurants, retail space on the first two levels, a basement "speakeasy" in the old jail, and office and co-working space.